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Darlington community reads about Holocaust survivor’s experiences
May 27, 2004 8:00 AM
By Stefan Eady - Faculty
Summer reading for the Darlington community will include All But My Life by Gerda Weissmann Klein, selected as the school-wide book project for next year. Klein’s classic autobiography, in print for 40 years in 55 editions, depicts her view of the dark years of the Holocaust, a progression that ultimately led to her liberation from a death march by her future husband, Kurt Klein, an American intelligence officer. Her book is the first full-length first person account of a holocaust survivor printed in the United States.
Klein will visit Darlington and speak with students on Oct. 1, as part of Fall Parents Weekend. Students will read the book and take an objective test on it the first day of class next fall. After that, English classes will study All But My Life in more detail, and further writing assignments will be made after the class has discussed it further.
Many people recognize Klein from the 1995 HBO documentary, One Survivor Remembers, in which the author recounts some of her wartime experiences. The documentary won a TV Emmy Award, two Cable Ace Awards, and an Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
In 1939, then 15-year-old Klein’s life changed forever as German troops invaded her home in Beilsko, Poland. Her brother Arthur was ordered to a labor camp and she was cruelly separated from her parents and sent to a slave-labor camp. This day was the last time she ever saw her family again. Never losing hope, Klein spent the next three years in a succession of slave-labor camps, until she was forced to walk in a 350-mile death march in which 2,000 women were subjected to exposure, starvation, and arbitrary execution. Despite such atrocities, Klein never lost the will to survive.
Klein will visit Darlington and speak with students on Oct. 1, as part of Fall Parents Weekend. Students will read the book and take an objective test on it the first day of class next fall. After that, English classes will study All But My Life in more detail, and further writing assignments will be made after the class has discussed it further.
Many people recognize Klein from the 1995 HBO documentary, One Survivor Remembers, in which the author recounts some of her wartime experiences. The documentary won a TV Emmy Award, two Cable Ace Awards, and an Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
In 1939, then 15-year-old Klein’s life changed forever as German troops invaded her home in Beilsko, Poland. Her brother Arthur was ordered to a labor camp and she was cruelly separated from her parents and sent to a slave-labor camp. This day was the last time she ever saw her family again. Never losing hope, Klein spent the next three years in a succession of slave-labor camps, until she was forced to walk in a 350-mile death march in which 2,000 women were subjected to exposure, starvation, and arbitrary execution. Despite such atrocities, Klein never lost the will to survive.
